Instagram was born as a humble photo-sharing platform, before evolving to also include videos. But trends shift, and the Meta-owned platform failed to see it coming.
Instagram head Adam Mosseri—a veteran at the company since before taking the helm in 2018—acknowledged that the landscape has shifted "dramatically."
He noted that only a small portion of Instagram’s user engagement now revolves around family and friends, as the platform pivots more aggressively into video content in a bid to compete with TikTok and capture the attention of a younger, under-30 audience, often offering nearly identical features.
His testimony comes amid government allegations that Meta holds a social media monopoly, a claim Mosseri pushed back on by highlighting the intense and fast-paced competition.
Since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, TikTok kept expanding without anything capable of even slowing its pace.
TikTok's explosive growth posed a serious threat to Instagram, according to Meta’s internal assessments and Mosseri court testimony.
"TikTok is probably the fiercest competition we have faced during my tenure at the company," he said.
Internal documents from 2019 showed TikTok was a major factor in Instagram's declining user engagement, with data scientists attributing up to 40% of the year-over-year drop in time spent on the platform to TikTok—23% of that in the U.S. alone.
In response, Instagram launched Reels in 2020 as a direct competitor.
But since business is business, and as competition continues, Mosseri said that he kept Mark Zuckerberg regularly informed, even providing updates during Meta’s top executive dinners, which happens monthly.
"It became kind of a hazing ritual for me to give an update on Reels," he said.
As revealed at court, Adam Mosseri wrote to his team in March 2020 that:
" [...] you’re either growing, or you’re slowly dying."
Mosseri testified that Facebook’s decision to buy Instagram could go down as "“one of the best acquisitions of all time."
When Instagram was acquired by Facebook, it gained access to the tech giant’s vast resources, infrastructure, and strategic muscle. In return, Facebook tapped into Instagram’s youthful appeal, design sensibility, and the sharp instincts of its founders—at a time when Facebook itself was already losing favor among younger users.
Yet staying ahead in the ever-evolving social media race hasn’t been easy. The arrival of TikTok upended the status quo, forcing Instagram to rethink its identity and aggressively shift toward entertainment and video-first content. In many ways, Instagram has mimicked TikTok, introducing similar features like Reels in a bid to reclaim younger audiences.
Still, as Adam Mosseri—Instagram’s head since 2018—testified, while entertainment content has grown significantly on the platform, connecting people with their friends remains a foundational element of Instagram’s experience. This enduring focus on social connection is what sets it apart from purely entertainment-driven platforms, even as the lines continue to blur.
Mosseri’s remarks not only underscored the intense competitive pressure TikTok exerts, but also highlighted Instagram’s delicate balancing act: adapting to shifting trends without abandoning the social roots that built its success. A tension that sits at the heart of ongoing scrutiny over whether Meta truly monopolizes the market.